SERIES: Part Four of a Four-Part Article

So you thought it was unique to you. You never thought anyone else faced this. You stayed up late at night wondering how you ended up with this person.

Well the reality is you are not alone!

Some people have evolved into a behavior and mindset that they are the only person in the universe and they can do whatever they want. Unfortunately, this mindset has evolved due to years of an overconfident economy and protective self-serving entities that have rewarded their behavior by overcompensation and avoidance. But most importantly, it has evolved because no one has ever truly held them accountable for their actions!

That behavior that gets recorded gets measured.

What gets measured gets addressed.

What gets addressed gets fixed!

Like a cancer within an organization, these people erode the mettle that makes an organization great. They serve to bitter those that would have otherwise been great contributors to your team.

So what are possible solutions? Consider:

Employee Assessment Instrument Facilitation – Consider the active use of your performance review instrument with this person and all employees. If the net purpose of a performance instrument is to coach individuals to peak performance, the case is self-made for regular monthly completion.

Employee Assessment Instrument Measurement Categories – Consider the behaviors necessary for an optimal performing business unit and the players within it. Each category of behaviors should be listed on your instrument. The score grid should be fair and allow for positive and brutally honest constructive feedback as well. If someone “fails/stinks” in an area, it should be brutally listed accordingly. Conversely, if someone excels in an area, they should be listed accordingly.

Employee Assessment Instrument Measurement “Problem Behavior” Categories – Recognize that with many problem employees, their implosion-causing behaviors are typically just outside the scope of your standard instrument. Every time a new corrosive behavior appears, let that be your clue to add a new individual entry or entire section for future assessment. Although the instrument will grow over time, it is actually a good thing. Remember: the purpose of the instrument is to improve professional performance, and one individual’s act of poor performance serves as a benchmark for ensuring others not evolve into poor habits and behaviors.

Duality of Signatures – Whichever instrument you use to identify poor behavior performance, it should require a signature by all parties involved in the review process. This should also specifically stipulate when the follow-up session will occur to determine if the identified behaviors and action plans are being addressed.

Resignation of Employment Clause – Consider crating a statement into your assessment instrument, stipulating that if the problematic behavior continues, the next assessment will serve as a 30-day notice. The notice should confirm that if the said behavior continues, the signed document would serve as a voluntary “Resignation Statement” that can be implemented by that organization’s leadership without further notice. This allows for two entire months for a person to change their behavior and two entire months for the leadership team to be held accountable to work with them from a solution-oriented perspective (for a sample instrument, get a copy of YIELD MANAGEMENT, a leading graduate management text with Appendix Instrument templates, at www.JeffreyMagee.com/library.asp.

The unfortunate situation that has grown out of this terrorist behavior is that it has become so corrosive to the team that the levels of greatness, which everyone could be experiencing, are lost. Also, there is always the concern of litigation after you free up someone’s future. Overwhelming documentation of a poor performer who has not aggressively worked to change that station is hard to legally defend. Conversely, your lack of data upon letting someone go will make for a heavy payday for the ambulance- chancing legal team!

While there is a significant amount of institutional knowledge, training and financial investment that an organization has made into every player in an organization, just “firing someone” should never be a first thought – or a thought at all! Robert Half & Associates, a leading employment search firm, estimates that the cost of transitioning one player out and going through the processes of getting a functioning new player online can cost upwards of two and a half times a person’s annual salary. As a tactical leader, it is necessary to realize the heavy investment you have made and determine every possible mean of salvaging that investment.

The “Personnel Assessment” you use for cultivating performance greatness and converting your terrorists into transformers will serve as a powerful objective instrument and allow for you to hold yourself to fair assessment.

So you thought it was unique to you. You never thought anyone else faced this. You stayed up late at night wondering how you ended up with this person.

Well the reality is you are not alone!

Some people have evolved into a behavior and mindset that they are the only person in the universe and they can do whatever they want. Unfortunately, this mindset has evolved due to years of an overconfident economy and protective self-serving entities that have rewarded their behavior by overcompensation and avoidance. But most importantly, it has evolved because no one has ever truly held them accountable for their actions!

That behavior that gets recorded gets measured.

What gets measured gets addressed.

What gets addressed gets fixed!

Like a cancer within an organization, these people erode the mettle that makes an organization great. They serve to bitter those that would have otherwise been great contributors to your team.

So what are possible solutions? Consider:

Employee Assessment Instrument Facilitation – Consider the active use of your performance review instrument with this person and all employees. If the net purpose of a performance instrument is to coach individuals to peak performance, the case is self-made for regular monthly completion.

Employee Assessment Instrument Measurement Categories – Consider the behaviors necessary for an optimal performing business unit and the players within it. Each category of behaviors should be listed on your instrument. The score grid should be fair and allow for positive and brutally honest constructive feedback as well. If someone “fails/stinks” in an area, it should be brutally listed accordingly. Conversely, if someone excels in an area, they should be listed accordingly.

Employee Assessment Instrument Measurement “Problem Behavior” Categories – Recognize that with many problem employees, their implosion-causing behaviors are typically just outside the scope of your standard instrument. Every time a new corrosive behavior appears, let that be your clue to add a new individual entry or entire section for future assessment. Although the instrument will grow over time, it is actually a good thing. Remember: the purpose of the instrument is to improve professional performance, and one individual’s act of poor performance serves as a benchmark for ensuring others not evolve into poor habits and behaviors.

Duality of Signatures – Whichever instrument you use to identify poor behavior performance, it should require a signature by all parties involved in the review process. This should also specifically stipulate when the follow-up session will occur to determine if the identified behaviors and action plans are being addressed.

Resignation of Employment Clause – Consider crating a statement into your assessment instrument, stipulating that if the problematic behavior continues, the next assessment will serve as a 30-day notice. The notice should confirm that if the said behavior continues, the signed document would serve as a voluntary “Resignation Statement” that can be implemented by that organization’s leadership without further notice. This allows for two entire months for a person to change their behavior and two entire months for the leadership team to be held accountable to work with them from a solution-oriented perspective (for a sample instrument, get a copy of YIELD MANAGEMENT, a leading graduate management text with Appendix Instrument templates, at www.JeffreyMagee.com/library.asp.

The unfortunate situation that has grown out of this terrorist behavior is that it has become so corrosive to the team that the levels of greatness, which everyone could be experiencing, are lost. Also, there is always the concern of litigation after you free up someone’s future. Overwhelming documentation of a poor performer who has not aggressively worked to change that station is hard to legally defend. Conversely, your lack of data upon letting someone go will make for a heavy payday for the ambulance- chancing legal team!

While there is a significant amount of institutional knowledge, training and financial investment that an organization has made into every player in an organization, just “firing someone” should never be a first thought – or a thought at all! Robert Half & Associates, a leading employment search firm, estimates that the cost of transitioning one player out and going through the processes of getting a functioning new player online can cost upwards of two and a half times a person’s annual salary. As a tactical leader, it is necessary to realize the heavy investment you have made and determine every possible mean of salvaging that investment.

The “Personnel Assessment” you use for cultivating performance greatness and converting your terrorists into transformers will serve as a powerful objective instrument and allow for you to hold yourself to fair assessment.

World-class communication exchanges made easy in the work place. What could be easier?

As a leader, how the other party interprets your message is crucial for the exchange process to occur. Understanding the act of communicating to another person or groups in the work place and in which level of the communication exchange process you are residing is also important to word economy and communication breakdown avoidance.

If you were to have an out-of-body experience and observe yourself communicating with someone either significantly younger or significantly older than yourself, you would notice how your behavioral patterns change, without much pain or effort, to allow for a successful exchange. When one transitions into a communication exchange with someone in the same peer group, however, many of the exchange process breakdowns occur due to simple resistance or avoidance to what one just did effortlessly with the youth or elder.

So, what are these behaviors, and what are the three exchange process steps to value- based action on the part of the recipient in your communication exchanges?

1. RECEIPT/RECEIVED of the message itself is obviously necessary if the message being sent is to be processed and acted upon. Many times, managers and leaders merely craft a message with little regard for the actual recipients. They send that message through the communication airwaves and assume it will be received and acted upon.

2. UNDERSTANDING of the communication signal being sent by the recipient is essential for the exchange process to evolve upward. Tailoring the message intent by using the appropriate words, syntax, tone, emphasis, imagery, stories, examples and statistics that the recipient can actually comprehend is essential at this second exchange level!

3. VALUE of that signal to that recipient causes action!

As a tactical leader, ensuring communication exchange success is dependent upon your ability to deploy the individual steps necessary to ensure each level is addressed thoroughly!

Here are several immediate application techniques to ensure each step is addressed as thoroughly as necessary and you don’t overkill any one level.

RECEIVED – Ensuring that the signal is received dictates an awareness of any possible interference issues and objectively looking at the transmission of the communication exchange from a broader perspective.

Make sure you communicate at the right time and place. Be sensitive to what is happening in the other person’s environment, and ask for verification that it has been receive. Also inquire if they would like the signal delivered in a different format than how you are delivering it at that present moment. The objective is to do something to ensure that if you are taking the time to send a message, it is, in fact, being received. If you d o not receive any immediate feedback confirming a message’s receipt, assume the responsibility to follow up with them in the near future to solicit feedback and determine if it was received. If you receive feedback that the message has been received, cease the delivery activity and evolve upward to the second communication exchange level. Another tactical way to ensure a signal is being received – with minimal interference – would be to ask the recipient to repeat the message; this will ensure the message is correctly relayed. Give the signal a bounce back mechanism – an email return receipt, a phone call response or a postal receipt vehicle – to merely let you know level one has successfully been accomplished.

UNDERSTOOD – Ensure that you adjust how the message is constructed so the recipient can understand and process its meaning. A lot of times, the core reason a person does not take action (Level Three, VALUE) in a communication exchange is due in large part to a breakdown at level two.

This is where one adjusts the jargon, slang, code words, phrases, vocal tones, speed, pitch and pace of the communication signal being delivered. This allows for an accent that can break down understanding based upon the level of education, knowledge, training or experience the parties involved in the communication interaction have!

The use of PowerPoint, handouts, slides, signage, literature, business cards, notes, audio and anything else used to reinforce the understanding of the message must be used judiciously and concluded at the precise moment the recipient clues you into the fact that they understand. The danger of continuing can be the complete disconnect by the recipient to the sender in the communication exchange process!

VALUE – When a signal has value, it motivates the recipient to take action. Your objective in crafting the signal is to build it from the other person’s vested interest level and perspective – the old “what’s in it for me” syndrome!

Motivating the recipient to take action is the net result of effectively crafting your message to evolve through the three levels. A person can sense value only when your message addresses two core needs: Pleasure or Pain. If they sense a better outcome, elevation in status or enrichment of any level, the “Pleasure” is implied, and the recipient will tend to sense a level of value and take action. Conversely, if your message communicates a worsening of lifestyle, status or position, “Pain” has been implied. If that reaches a level the recipient cannot tolerate, the action will again be taken.

The effective leader recognizes all of the nuances that tactically influence effective communication exchanges and strives to ensure he or she takes the necessary steps at each individual level to attain success with the intended recipient.

If the foundation of human behavior performance management and improvement rests on the psychology that one’s mindset (thoughts) dictates the behavior one exhibits, an effective leader recognizes daily the tactical actions that can reinforce positive behavior or influence negative behavior.

The code for mindset, thoughts and mental energy is ATTITUDE. Therefore, it would be valuable for a tactical leader to recognize all of the actions that can promote and foster constructive behaviors in those around them.

As an effective leader today, there are eight elementary tactics for encouraging positive ATTITUDE and holding individuals accountable to positive actions. Consider:

A = Always ASK those on your team questions about involvement and the best practices for every endeavor. By involving them early and often, a sense of inclusion will be created, and powerful working relationships will develop as well.

T = TEACH others at all levels as much as you can, as often as you can. If done in a spirit of cross training, it will ensure maximum performance from every player on your team. And with this approach, others will be able to provide enhancement ideas to one another as well as hold one another accountable to performance standards and expectations!

T = TOLERATE others’ approaches to executing a task, when different from your approach. Individuals always embrace their action plans with greater enthusiasm and passion. Your benchmark should be whether the other person’s action plan is: Legal, Ethical and Cost Effective. If it is, let go. If any one of these specific perimeters is not, then speak only to that one perimeter as you coach them and encourage them to maintain a wealthy attitude for success.

I = INFORM your team as often and as thoroughly as possible about everything! Consistently, the number one threat to active implementation of initiatives by the front line is when they are left to guess the motives of the leader’s policies. The hidden “why” factor causes more implosion and missed spent energy than any other single force. Answer this question, and others will actively embrace you!

T = TERMINATE poor performance behaviors immediately. An effective leader recognizes that a bad attitude left unengaged (not challenged) is like a cancer. Early detection and early engagement can lead to early elimination. Left unchecked, negative actions and thoughts spread, becoming systemic and leading to visible implosions in performance behaviors.

U = UNDERSTANDING is a hallmark characteristic of a powerful leader today. This implies that that the leader has tactically interacted with others to gain an understanding of others’ values, core beliefs, desires from their employment and an overall general perspective as to how they think and feel. With this, increased awareness and a significantly better understanding of how others will respond to a given situation will be gained!

D = DELEGATE appropriately to those on your team to gain increased productivity. Also develop the platform of skills necessary from individuals to ensure their growth, development and success.

The picture and numbers are very clear. Performance, whether good or bad, is directly tied to one’s ATTITUDE. As a leader, your tactics either reinforce the positive or encourage the negative. You make that decision.

An immediate clue you’re leading at the 30,000 feet level is where your attention is and remains. A clue that you are immersed in 5,000 feet issues is that you are off course as an organization.

Managers fly at the 5,000 feet level, but leaders must fly at the 30,000 feet level! Where should you be? Better yet, as a tactical leader in today’s marketplace, where must your organization have you to succeed?

Far too many major corporations find themselves in trouble today for one simple reason. They have placed 5,000 feet people in 30,000 feet positions. The momentum of the organization may carry them for a period of time, but if they are not capable of flying at the 30,000 feet level, they will eventually crash and burn!

One of the first indicators that an implosion is about to occur happens when people are placed into positions in which they functionally cannot perform. The first thing to go is one’s attitude, which directly impacts one’s behavior and treatment of those around them.

The needless victims of this crash are the people who make up an organization, and if a public traded firm, the shareholders as well.

A tactical leader, regardless of the place from which he or she operates, must understand the subtle nuances of 5,000 feet issues and 30,000 feet issues if they are to remain positively focused and create the proper attitude for others to follow suite.

First, the Analogy:

An airplane pilot knows that when departing and arriving they must be very focused and in total control of all plane operations, functions and actions in the area between the ground and 5,000 feet in the air. Thus, a high level of hands-on activity takes place. Most airplanes from 5,000 feet upward are on autopilot, meaning the actual pilot is not continuously involved in the total activity of managing and operating. Most pilots cruise in commercial aircraft at the 30,000 feet range, and at this level, you are able to assume more of a leadership role. You can see your horizon, destination, goals and overall big pictures, enabling you to make individual calculated course corrections to attain a successful arrival.

Second, the Application:

As a tactical leader, you must ensure your team is vested, empowered and held accountable to the 5,000 feet issues and basic operational activities that make your organization what it is. Examples of 5,000 feet actions are functioning tasks such as:

Meetings
Delegation
Training
Implementing, educating and enforcing policies, procedures and rules
Facilitating basic business processes that are what you are and do
Interfacing with end users or customers
Front line activities and behind the scenes functions that reinforce each
Dealing with conflicts, confrontations, problem behaviors and counseling or disciplinary issues
Etc.

When you as a leader have to come down from the 30,000 feet level, maintain a healthy perspective (attitude) in all of your interactions with others, as people will model what you telegraph to them. Also, stay focused because it is in the 5,000 feet issues that you can rally significant positive mental attitudes from the team that allow you the energy force necessary to be productive, be profitable and regain the 30,000 feet focus.

Examples of 30,000 feet actions are functioning tasks such as:

Planning, mission statement design, strategy sessions, ensuring that the values and integrity of the organization are maintained
Organizing big picture issues, advocates, personnel assets, etc.
Coordinating resources and personnel talent pools from which business functions will be drawn today and in the future (succession planning)
Building partnerships and alliances, forecasting market needs and maintaining course clarity for growth
Etc.

A tactical leader must understand necessary interpersonal skills, how to work the people equations effectively at both levels and be committed to instant interactions, if necessary, to ensure maximum positive influence at each level. Therefore, when a tactical leader is not at the 30,000 feet level, they must ask, “Who is left at the destiny controls?”

Maintaining 30,000 feet control takes a powerfully focused, controlled and positive mindset (attitude). Ask yourself who you interact with, who you seek counsel from, who you collaborate with and who serves as your model. All of these are 30,000 feet tactical leader questions.

Making sure everyone is flying with you requires you to stay on top of the environmental matters that allow people to either soar or come down into the turbulence of 5,000 feet implosions and mundane functionality issues.

So you thought it was unique to you. You never thought anyone else faced this. You stayed up late at night wondering how you ended up with this person.

Well the reality is you are not alone!

Some people have evolved into a behavior and mindset that they are the only person in the universe and they can do whatever they want. Unfortunately, this mindset has evolved due to years of an overconfident economy and protective self-serving entities that have rewarded their behavior by overcompensation and avoidance. But most importantly, it has evolved because no one has ever truly held them accountable for their actions!

That behavior that gets recorded gets measured.

What gets measured gets addressed.

What gets addressed gets fixed!

Like a cancer within an organization, these people erode the mettle that makes an organization great. They serve to bitter those that would have otherwise been great contributors to your team.

So what are possible solutions? Consider:

Employee Assessment Instrument Facilitation – Consider the active use of your performance review instrument with this person and all employees. If the net purpose of a performance instrument is to coach individuals to peak performance, the case is self-made for regular monthly completion.

Employee Assessment Instrument Measurement Categories – Consider the behaviors necessary for an optimal performing business unit and the players within it. Each category of behaviors should be listed on your instrument. The score grid should be fair and allow for positive and brutally honest constructive feedback as well. If someone “fails/stinks” in an area, it should be brutally listed accordingly. Conversely, if someone excels in an area, they should be listed accordingly.

Employee Assessment Instrument Measurement “Problem Behavior” Categories – Recognize that with many problem employees, their implosion-causing behaviors are typically just outside the scope of your standard instrument. Every time a new corrosive behavior appears, let that be your clue to add a new individual entry or entire section for future assessment. Although the instrument will grow over time, it is actually a good thing. Remember: the purpose of the instrument is to improve professional performance, and one individual’s act of poor performance serves as a benchmark for ensuring others not evolve into poor habits and behaviors.

Duality of Signatures – Whichever instrument you use to identify poor behavior performance, it should require a signature by all parties involved in the review process. This should also specifically stipulate when the follow-up session will occur to determine if the identified behaviors and action plans are being addressed.

Resignation of Employment Clause – Consider crating a statement into your assessment instrument, stipulating that if the problematic behavior continues, the next assessment will serve as a 30-day notice. The notice should confirm that if the said behavior continues, the signed document would serve as a voluntary “Resignation Statement” that can be implemented by that organization’s leadership without further notice. This allows for two entire months for a person to change their behavior and two entire months for the leadership team to be held accountable to work with them from a solution-oriented perspective (for a sample instrument, get a copy of YIELD MANAGEMENT, a leading graduate management text with Appendix Instrument templates, at www.JeffreyMagee.com/library.asp.

The unfortunate situation that has grown out of this terrorist behavior is that it has become so corrosive to the team that the levels of greatness, which everyone could be experiencing, are lost. Also, there is always the concern of litigation after you free up someone’s future. Overwhelming documentation of a poor performer who has not aggressively worked to change that station is hard to legally defend. Conversely, your lack of data upon letting someone go will make for a heavy payday for the ambulance- chancing legal team!

While there is a significant amount of institutional knowledge, training and financial investment that an organization has made into every player in an organization, just “firing someone” should never be a first thought – or a thought at all! Robert Half & Associates, a leading employment search firm, estimates that the cost of transitioning one player out and going through the processes of getting a functioning new player online can cost upwards of two and a half times a person’s annual salary. As a tactical leader, it is necessary to realize the heavy investment you have made and determine every possible mean of salvaging that investment.

The “Personnel Assessment” you use for cultivating performance greatness and converting your terrorists into transformers will serve as a powerful objective instrument and allow for you to hold yourself to fair assessment.

World-class communication exchanges made easy in the work place. What could be easier?

As a leader, how the other party interprets your message is crucial for the exchange process to occur. Understanding the act of communicating to another person or groups in the work place and in which level of the communication exchange process you are residing is also important to word economy and communication breakdown avoidance.

If you were to have an out-of-body experience and observe yourself communicating with someone either significantly younger or significantly older than yourself, you would notice how your behavioral patterns change, without much pain or effort, to allow for a successful exchange. When one transitions into a communication exchange with someone in the same peer group, however, many of the exchange process breakdowns occur due to simple resistance or avoidance to what one just did effortlessly with the youth or elder.

So, what are these behaviors, and what are the three exchange process steps to value- based action on the part of the recipient in your communication exchanges?

1. RECEIPT/RECEIVED of the message itself is obviously necessary if the message being sent is to be processed and acted upon. Many times, managers and leaders merely craft a message with little regard for the actual recipients. They send that message through the communication airwaves and assume it will be received and acted upon.

2. UNDERSTANDING of the communication signal being sent by the recipient is essential for the exchange process to evolve upward. Tailoring the message intent by using the appropriate words, syntax, tone, emphasis, imagery, stories, examples and statistics that the recipient can actually comprehend is essential at this second exchange level!

3. VALUE of that signal to that recipient causes action!

As a tactical leader, ensuring communication exchange success is dependent upon your ability to deploy the individual steps necessary to ensure each level is addressed thoroughly!

Here are several immediate application techniques to ensure each step is addressed as thoroughly as necessary and you don’t overkill any one level.

RECEIVED – Ensuring that the signal is received dictates an awareness of any possible interference issues and objectively looking at the transmission of the communication exchange from a broader perspective.

Make sure you communicate at the right time and place. Be sensitive to what is happening in the other person’s environment, and ask for verification that it has been receive. Also inquire if they would like the signal delivered in a different format than how you are delivering it at that present moment. The objective is to do something to ensure that if you are taking the time to send a message, it is, in fact, being received. If you d o not receive any immediate feedback confirming a message’s receipt, assume the responsibility to follow up with them in the near future to solicit feedback and determine if it was received. If you receive feedback that the message has been received, cease the delivery activity and evolve upward to the second communication exchange level. Another tactical way to ensure a signal is being received – with minimal interference – would be to ask the recipient to repeat the message; this will ensure the message is correctly relayed. Give the signal a bounce back mechanism – an email return receipt, a phone call response or a postal receipt vehicle – to merely let you know level one has successfully been accomplished.

UNDERSTOOD – Ensure that you adjust how the message is constructed so the recipient can understand and process its meaning. A lot of times, the core reason a person does not take action (Level Three, VALUE) in a communication exchange is due in large part to a breakdown at level two.

This is where one adjusts the jargon, slang, code words, phrases, vocal tones, speed, pitch and pace of the communication signal being delivered. This allows for an accent that can break down understanding based upon the level of education, knowledge, training or experience the parties involved in the communication interaction have!

The use of PowerPoint, handouts, slides, signage, literature, business cards, notes, audio and anything else used to reinforce the understanding of the message must be used judiciously and concluded at the precise moment the recipient clues you into the fact that they understand. The danger of continuing can be the complete disconnect by the recipient to the sender in the communication exchange process!

VALUE – When a signal has value, it motivates the recipient to take action. Your objective in crafting the signal is to build it from the other person’s vested interest level and perspective – the old “what’s in it for me” syndrome!

Motivating the recipient to take action is the net result of effectively crafting your message to evolve through the three levels. A person can sense value only when your message addresses two core needs: Pleasure or Pain. If they sense a better outcome, elevation in status or enrichment of any level, the “Pleasure” is implied, and the recipient will tend to sense a level of value and take action. Conversely, if your message communicates a worsening of lifestyle, status or position, “Pain” has been implied. If that reaches a level the recipient cannot tolerate, the action will again be taken.

The effective leader recognizes all of the nuances that tactically influence effective communication exchanges and strives to ensure he or she takes the necessary steps at each individual level to attain success with the intended recipient.